Synthesis of chitosan-alginate microspheres with high antimicrobial and antibiofilm activity against multi-drug resistant microbial pathogens

Abstract

The successful treatment of multi-drug resistant microbial pathogens represents a major challenge for public health management. Here, chitosan-alginate (CS/ALG) microspheres with narrow size distribution were fabricated by ionically cross linking method using Ca2+ ions as agents for polymer solidification. The physicochemical properties of CS/ALG microspheres, such as surface morphology and size, were studied by SEM. The functional group interactions were confirmed by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. SEM revealed that the CS/ALG microspheres were spherical in shape with smooth surfaces, size was 50–100 μm. The synthesized CS/ALG microspheres showed antibacterial and antibiofilm activity on bacteria of public health relevance. CS/ALG microspheres exhibited antibacterial activity at the concentration of 5–20 μg, with significant inhibitory zones on multiple antibiotic resistant pathogens, including Gram positive Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis, and Gram negative Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Proteus vulgaris. Furthermore, in situ light microscopy and confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) showed that CS/ALG microspheres inhibited the bacterial biofilm formation in S. aureus, E. faecalis P. aeruginosa and P. vulgaris after a single treatment with 40 μg. Overall, our findings underlined that chemically synthesized CS/ALG biomaterial has high antibacterial and antibiofilm activity against a number of microbial pathogens of interest for human health, thus this synthesis route can be further exploited for drug development in current biomedical science.